Guilt and the Irony of Faculty/Staff Parking
I stole someone's parking spot today. I mean, not technically; the spots are first-come, first-served, but I know that I did and I'm not sure how I feel about it.
Parking on campus is complicated. I think parking is always complicated, sometimes even in my own driveway. If I can get to work by 7:45 a.m., I can always park in Snively Lot. That's not its actual name, but it's what we call it because it's the lot next to the old Snively Ice Arena. Now that that's been converted to the student fitness center, most of the younger folk on campus don't even know the name Snively, but it's still what John and I call the lot. It's small, so it fills up fast, and it's always been the closest lot I knew of to our buildings.
If I miss the 7:45 a.m. cutoff, I have to go to the Alumni Center to park. It's about a block further out, and a larger lot, so there's always parking there until 9 o'clock or so, unless there's an event going on and they cordon off part of the lot. Then I have to go to the lot-without-a-name-as-far-as-I-can-remember. It's the one across from the New England Center; a 13-story hotel and conference center built in the woods next to campus back in the 80s. Now it's been converted to space for the hotel management program, I think ... it's too expensive to do the maintenance to continue using it as it was intended to be used, and too expensive to tear down. Poor administration. Whatever. When they closed it down as a hotel, the parking lot that served it was opened up to faculty and staff. It's about the same distance from my office as Alumni Lot, but a more circuitous route through the woods and other parking lots. It's a little farther to John's office.
If' I'm coming to campus later in the day - after 10:30 a.m. - who knows where I can park? There's always A Lot or B Lot, both much further from the office, and both of which fill up about the same. I've been known to park all the way down by the greenhouses beyond A Lot, which is fine during nice weather but awful in the nadir of winter cold.
It was on the way from the New England Center lot (for lack of a better name since I can never remember what that one is actually called) that I discovered this tiny treasure. It's a small lot; about 20 spaces, right behind the new Admissions office, which is directly across the street from my office. I have never seen open spots there, even at 7:45 a.m. There are some hard-core faculty and staff parking there, close to administrative offices and the business school, and arriving early enough to claim the privilege.
This morning, that was me. John had an early flight out of Logan airport this morning, and we drove down last night and stayed in a hotel near the airport to avoid having to get up at some unholy hour to get him to the airport on time. It was actually quite nice. We got to relax, turn in early, and get up at a merely moderately perverse hour so he could catch the shuttle to the airport. I could have stayed at the hotel and slept more, but I was already up, so I drove back north and went straight to campus. I have so much reading to do for my class this evening, I figured there was no need to waste time driving home and then back to campus; I could use the extra forty minutes to read. Or write a blog post.
So I pulled into campus around 6:40 a.m. and the thought occurred to me, "I'll bet I can park in the close lot today." I don't know the name of that lot either. Who am I kidding? Other than A Lot and B Lot, I don't know the official names of any of the parking lots on campus. But I knew that I had a shot at parking in one of the chosen spaces.
And even as the thought occurred to me, I felt guilty. Was it wrong of me to take someone else's spot, even if the spots aren't assigned? All I could think of was that, if I did, this morning some poor schlub was going to get up at their usual efficient hour, get ready in their usual efficient manner, drive to campus safely and early like always, only to find that there was no place for them to park because an unfamiliar gray Sonata had appeared out of nowhere. It seemed unfair and almost mean. I was messing with the juju of someone's morning routine. If I were a person who had a neat and tidy morning routine - I am not - I would be unsettled, annoyed, even frustrated if what I planned on every day was thwarted by some slacker who actually had a reason to be to work crazy early one random day.
And I almost didn't park there. I almost drove to Snively to claim one of the closest spots there. They would nearly all be available at 6:40. Curiosity and greed got the better of me, though, and I drove into the heart of campus and parked my car right smack in one of those sweet, sweet spaces. It was a chilly but very brief walk to my office this morning, and it was only then that I remembered that my class this evening is in Morrill Hall, several buildings away from my office ... and right across the street from Snively lot.
Oh, the irony.
Parking on campus is complicated. I think parking is always complicated, sometimes even in my own driveway. If I can get to work by 7:45 a.m., I can always park in Snively Lot. That's not its actual name, but it's what we call it because it's the lot next to the old Snively Ice Arena. Now that that's been converted to the student fitness center, most of the younger folk on campus don't even know the name Snively, but it's still what John and I call the lot. It's small, so it fills up fast, and it's always been the closest lot I knew of to our buildings.
If I miss the 7:45 a.m. cutoff, I have to go to the Alumni Center to park. It's about a block further out, and a larger lot, so there's always parking there until 9 o'clock or so, unless there's an event going on and they cordon off part of the lot. Then I have to go to the lot-without-a-name-as-far-as-I-can-remember. It's the one across from the New England Center; a 13-story hotel and conference center built in the woods next to campus back in the 80s. Now it's been converted to space for the hotel management program, I think ... it's too expensive to do the maintenance to continue using it as it was intended to be used, and too expensive to tear down. Poor administration. Whatever. When they closed it down as a hotel, the parking lot that served it was opened up to faculty and staff. It's about the same distance from my office as Alumni Lot, but a more circuitous route through the woods and other parking lots. It's a little farther to John's office.
If' I'm coming to campus later in the day - after 10:30 a.m. - who knows where I can park? There's always A Lot or B Lot, both much further from the office, and both of which fill up about the same. I've been known to park all the way down by the greenhouses beyond A Lot, which is fine during nice weather but awful in the nadir of winter cold.
It was on the way from the New England Center lot (for lack of a better name since I can never remember what that one is actually called) that I discovered this tiny treasure. It's a small lot; about 20 spaces, right behind the new Admissions office, which is directly across the street from my office. I have never seen open spots there, even at 7:45 a.m. There are some hard-core faculty and staff parking there, close to administrative offices and the business school, and arriving early enough to claim the privilege.
This morning, that was me. John had an early flight out of Logan airport this morning, and we drove down last night and stayed in a hotel near the airport to avoid having to get up at some unholy hour to get him to the airport on time. It was actually quite nice. We got to relax, turn in early, and get up at a merely moderately perverse hour so he could catch the shuttle to the airport. I could have stayed at the hotel and slept more, but I was already up, so I drove back north and went straight to campus. I have so much reading to do for my class this evening, I figured there was no need to waste time driving home and then back to campus; I could use the extra forty minutes to read. Or write a blog post.
So I pulled into campus around 6:40 a.m. and the thought occurred to me, "I'll bet I can park in the close lot today." I don't know the name of that lot either. Who am I kidding? Other than A Lot and B Lot, I don't know the official names of any of the parking lots on campus. But I knew that I had a shot at parking in one of the chosen spaces.
And even as the thought occurred to me, I felt guilty. Was it wrong of me to take someone else's spot, even if the spots aren't assigned? All I could think of was that, if I did, this morning some poor schlub was going to get up at their usual efficient hour, get ready in their usual efficient manner, drive to campus safely and early like always, only to find that there was no place for them to park because an unfamiliar gray Sonata had appeared out of nowhere. It seemed unfair and almost mean. I was messing with the juju of someone's morning routine. If I were a person who had a neat and tidy morning routine - I am not - I would be unsettled, annoyed, even frustrated if what I planned on every day was thwarted by some slacker who actually had a reason to be to work crazy early one random day.
And I almost didn't park there. I almost drove to Snively to claim one of the closest spots there. They would nearly all be available at 6:40. Curiosity and greed got the better of me, though, and I drove into the heart of campus and parked my car right smack in one of those sweet, sweet spaces. It was a chilly but very brief walk to my office this morning, and it was only then that I remembered that my class this evening is in Morrill Hall, several buildings away from my office ... and right across the street from Snively lot.
Oh, the irony.
Too funny, Linda! We/I have the same drama with parking each morning, except that I am only assigned to one lot. There is one section of it that is closer by 3 minutes walking and is directly across from the tunnel leading to the hospital and medical complex buildings. The strategy and stress created by these "sweet, sweet spots" tests my patience daily. If I do NOT manage to wrangle one of those spots, I swear I start my day cranky (and if I somehow am able to shake it off during the day, shortly before I leave the office I re-enter the world of crank 'cause I remember how frikkin' far I have to walk!! OK, breathe...) And I become more and more tenacious about getting a place...and I'm sure the night shifters feel stalked every day by those of us lurking in the lanes, watching their every move while they get reacclimated to their car and reposition their rear view mirrors. I long for the day (probably 8-10 years in the future) when I will be blessed with a tag for one of the parking garages...just in time for retirement! Thanks for sharing your parking tribulations!! Allison
ReplyDeleteI love this! And if you stop calling it Snively, I'll never know what you're talking about!
ReplyDelete